Rachel Dunn selected for ANZ

TEAM BATH and England shooter Rachel Dunn has become the sixth England international netballer to join the ANZ Championship.

Published: 00:00, Mon, May 12, 2008

England shooter Rachel Dunn in action

She will replace pregnant Silver Fern shooter Jodi Brown in the Tactix squad, based in Christchurch, New Zealand.

The 25-year-old joins England squad colleagues Ama Agbeze, Karen Atkinson, Tamsin Greenway, Geva Mentor and Sonia Mkoloma who are already playing in the competition that includes five teams from Australia and five from New Zealand in what is the world's first professional netball league.

Dunn will take to the court against some of the best netballers in the world, and she says it can only be a positive move for the English game.

"It's great," she said. "We wouldn't want to miss out on this sort of competition. Hopefully it will be a good thing for England netball to increase our strength and keep pushing these teams from Down Under."

Dunn has 25 international caps for England, including playing in England’s first win over New Zealand in 32 years in Manchester last summer.

But she was forced to miss out on last year's Netball World Championships after suffering a serious knee injury in the series win over Jamaica in September 2007.

After a long and intensive rehabilitation period, she returned to the court more than a month ago and was part of England's training squad for the home series against Malawi.

She made her England debut in 2004 against South Africa and toured New Zealand with England in 2005, before being part of the England squad which won bronze at the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne in 2006.

She has already travelled south to New Zealand, training twice with her new squad, before watching her side defeat the Southern Sting 51-48 in Invercargill last Saturday.

Dunn’s first appearance in the ANZ Championship is likely to be on May 17 against the Central Pulse in Palmerston, New Zealand, where she could meet England team mate Sonia Mkoloma.